The Truth About Feline Allergies

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Feline Allergies are often misunderstood. It's not a surprise because we, of course, base our understanding about a lot of things on our own experiences.

Most of us, when we are talking about our own allergies, are referring to symptoms such as sneezing and watery eyes. We transfer that same meaning to our understanding of feline allergies.

However, a cat allergy is most commonly associated with feline skin problems. If your cat is sneezing and has red eyes, he probably has a cat "cold", not cat allergies.

Most cases of feline allergies fall into one of three categories: (1) cat flea allergies (2) feline food allergy (3) Atopic Allergies in cats (also known as inhalant or environmental allergies) In all cases, symptoms almost always involve the cat's skin. Food allergy may also play a role in inflammatory bowel disease in cats.

Cat medicine or other treatment for cat allergies depends very much on finding out which type of allergy your cat has. The treatment for each type of cat allergy is different so the greatest success, of course, will be achieved if we know what we are treating.

Cat flea allergy is by far the most common of all feline allergies. Flea allergies can lead to extreme itchiness with hair loss and irritated skin. The skin reaction and your cat's self-mutilation as a result of the itchiness can be quite extreme. Cat flea allergy can make your cat miserable and it can be caused by only one flea bite!

That's right. Just as one bee sting can kill a person, one flea bite can make your cat destroy his own fur and skin. It's often difficult for me to convince a cat owner that their kitty has cat flea allergy because we frequently cannot find a single flea on the cat.

That's due to two reasons:

(1) as mentioned, it only takes one flea to make a cat with flea allergies crazy with itchiness, and

(2) the cat easily may have ingested any flea(s) on the body during the process of scratching and licking and biting his skin.

Actually, let me add a third reason to that: many of us just cannot believe our pet or our home could possibly have fleas. People often equate fleas with poor housekeeping, but that is a myth.

The treatment for feline allergies caused by fleas is obviously to use cat flea medicine. If your cat's skin is extremely traumatized, an additional cat medicine to decrease the itchiness and inflammation may be used temporarily.

There are many different brands of cat flea medication. I have had the greatest success with Frontline Plus cat flea medication and feel most comfortable with it. I have found Frontline flea medicine to be highly effective, but also very non-toxic for cats and for the people around them.

You can find less expensive flea treatment for cats, but please be careful and consult your veterinarian. I have seen too many cats die from toxicity from using poor quality cat flea medicine.

If your cat is having skin irritation and/or itchiness, think feline allergies first and think cat flea allergy ahead of the other cat allergies. Always consult your veterinarian for a definitive diagnosis and safe treatment.

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